Harry Shearer

Having been the voice of 21 characters on the long-running animated sitcom "The Simpsons" (Fox, 1989- ), actor and comedian Harry Shearer was known by millions without most even recognizing his face....
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Veteran funnyman Harry Shearer is reviving Spinal Tap's festive anthem Christmas With The Devil for an assault on the holiday charts. The Simpsons regular, who played bassist Derek Smalls in the mock rock band, has reworked the group's track with his singer wife, Judith Owen, for a Christmas 2014 release.
He says of the project, "(It is) maybe the most beautiful, moving Christmas song ever, played and sung with restrained yet unmistakeable emotion... We always hear about what holiday time is like for Santa and his elves. But what's going on around that time with the Supreme Evil One? This song fills that much-needed void and swings as well."
The song features the lyrics, "There's someone up the chimney hole/And Satan is his name/The rats ate all the presents/And the reindeer ran away."
Proceeds from the single, which is due for release next month (Dec14), will be donated to mental health charity Sane.

Hollywood comedian Mike Myers became an honorary member of Monty Python on Sunday night (20Jul14) as the veteran funnymen closed their reunion shows in London. The comedy troupe bowed out at the city's O2 Arena after a run of 10 comeback shows, and Austin Powers star Myers made a surprise appearance onstage during the last performance, which was broadcast live on TV and in cinemas.
Myers joined in a sketch with Michael Palin, while British funnyman Eddie Izzard also made a guest appearance.
Other stars in attendance at the final show included Martin Freeman, Harry Shearer and David Walliams.

The stars of comedy rock act Spinal Tap made a secret pilgrimage to the real Stonehenge site after their performance at Britain's Glastonbury Festival. The iconic stone circle in Wiltshire, England is part of the spoof band's folklore due to its inclusion in 1984 movie This Is Spinal Tap.
In the film, the group orders a giant replica of Stonehenge to be used on stage, only to discover the model is only 18 inches high instead of the intended 18 feet, and the gag was revived in many of the group's live shows.
Harry Shearer, who plays bassist Derek Smalls, now admits they all came face-to-face with the real thing after their performance at the Glastonbury Festival in England in 2009. He tells Britain's The Guardian newspaper, "The most memorable thing (about the Glastonbury show) was driving back to London afterwards. It was 6.30pm, someone saw this little thing to the left of the motorway and went: 'Look, there's Stonehenge.' I went: 'Come on, that's a replica where a petrol station should be.' But of course, it's the real one. So at 6.45pm, we drove in and they (site bosses) said 'No, we're closing at seven. Christopher (Guest) and I are fairly shy but our keyboard player, God bless him, is a fairly forward lad so he just walked up and said: 'You've gotta let these guys in, they put this place on the map.'
"The gates duly opened. So that goes down as my favourite ever solstice."

Universal Pictures via Everett Collection
Get your fresh-squeezed pink lemonade and don’t forget to take a puppy on the way out: the follow-up to Bridesmaids is on its way. Kristen Wiig and co-writer and creative partner Annie Mumolo revealed Wednesday to the New York Times that they’re beginning work on a new film, which will see the pair play best friends who “find themselves in over their heads and out of their depths, which were, perhaps, not too deep to begin with.” The film, which as of right now has neither a title nor a tentative release date, will also center around a town called Vista Del Mar, and is slated to become Wiig’s directorial debut.
In a statement about the project, Wiig revealed that she has been interested in stepping behind the camera for some time now, and felt that this project is the perfect opportunity for her first go. But this film wouldn’t just mark Wiig’s directorial debut; it would also mark the first time that a female cast member on Saturday Night Live has helmed a feature film.
Though former featured player Laura Kightlinger directed the 2003 documentary 60 Spins Around the Sun, a picture about the career of comedian Randy Credico, none of the women from the historic series has managed to make the jump over to narrative film directing in the last 40 years. However, many male regulars have moved behind the camera – everyone from Bill Murray to Harry Shearer to Chris Rock to Ben Stiller has directed movies, many of which are critically-acclaimed. While directors in general tend to be overwhelmingly male, it’s most surprising that SNL, a show which has a reputation for producing multi-hyphenate artists who are adept at a number of skills and genres, still has yet to produce a female director from among its ranks of repertory players.
After all, plenty of those actors are household names by the time that they leave the show. They spend most of their time on SNL heavily involved in the creative process, developing and writing their own material week in and week out, and often help make decisions about costuming, staging, and performance choices. All of those experiences and talents would lend themselves to directing. We'd expect many performers and writers with experiences in these fields to gravitate behind the camera at some point. So, why, then have so few of SNL’s female performers made the jump?
Despite the success of female-fronted and written films like Bridesmaids, it’s still much harder for women in Hollywood to get projects greenlit by studios than it is for men. Studios still assume that male audiences don’t want to see films about or for women, even though many female-fronted comedies over the last few years have gone on to become some of the most successful films of all time. Bridesmaids is the seventh highest-grossing R-rated comedy ever made, and yet the industry still treats its success as an anomaly that won’t be repeated. Considering how difficult it has been for many of the women on SNL to break into film as performers, it makes sense that they’d struggle even more to get a directing project financed.
Still, there is some hope that things will get better soon. Tri-Star Entertainment trusting Wiig to direct her follow-up to Bridesmaids – a film that is under a great deal of pressure, since Wiig and Mumolo rightly refused to make a unnecessary sequel – is a major sign of confidence not only in Wiig, but in women-fronted films in general. It may only be possible because of her first project’s massive success, but it’s still a major step forward, especially since studios have begun to trust other women-centric comedies to female directors, like Elizabeth Banks and Pitch Perfect 2. There are also a few SNL alums making their directorial debuts on TV shows, like Amy Poehler, who has helmed episodes of Parks and Recreation and Broad City, and that experience will help convince studios to hire more women on their projects. Not to mention plenty of women who, like Wiig, have often-stated an interest in directing (both Poehler and Tina Fey have expressed the desire to tackle a film soon), and more big-name performers stepping behind the scenes will help open the door for women who might not be as instantly recognizable.
Unfortunately, though, studios still see female-fronted and -directed films as a risk, which makes it difficult for women to break into different roles. It’s depressing that Wiig, despite becoming a household name thanks to her time on Saturday Night Live, is the first female cast member to make the jump to directing. The show produces plenty of multi-talented women, and between the clout and name-recognition that SNL gives them, their ability to adapt to a variety of tasks and situations, and the way audiences are begging for more female-centric films, hiring more of those women to follow in Wiig’s footsteps would be a risk worth taking.
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NBC Universal Media/Getty Images
Over the almost 50 years of Saturday Night Live, there have been plenty of seasons that were good (more than most casual observers would like to admit) and bad (some spectacularly so). There was, though, only one 1984: quite possibly the strangest season in the history of the show.
With Eddie Murphy completely gone to pursue his superstar movie career and the second most recognizable cast member, Joe Piscopo, having worn out his welcome after the 1983 - '84 season, executive producer Dick Ebersol was left without a star. The remaining cast members, including a young Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Jim Belushi, had never quite fit in with the show and were largely dissatisfied with the way that they had been treated. Many people figured that Murphy leaving would finally signal the death knell for SNL.
Righting a Wrong
Instead of trying to develop another young talent like Murphy, Ebersol turned to more established comedians, including one who had almost been part of the original SNL cast. By 1984, Billy Crystal was already a well known entertainer after his stint on the sitcom Soap and his numerous talk show appearances where he imitated celebrities like boxer Mohammed Ali, but in 1974 Crystal had been cut from the original Not Ready for Prime Time Players on the eve of the show's debut. Why that happened depends largely on who tells the story, but whatever the case, when Chevy Chase, Gilda Radner, John Belushi, and Dan Aykroyd rocketed to fame, Crystal wasn’t with them. Nor was he offered the spot that went to Bill Murray when Chase left after the first season. Ten years later, Crystal was finally being given the chance to right what he considered a wrong.
The Rest of the Gang
Along with Crystal, Ebersol brought in Martin Short, who had already been a cast member of Canada's SCTV (which launched the careers of John Candy, Rick Moranis, and Catherine O'Hara), as well as Christopher Guest and Harry Shearer, fresh off their success in This Is Spinal Tap. Rich Hall, who had been part of an ensemble HBO comedy show called Not Necessarily the News, and Pamela Stephenson, who had been on the British precursor (Not the Nine O'clock News) of Hall's HBO show rounded out the new cast members. It was an odd turn of events considering that Crystal hosted SNL twice the season before he joined the cast, while Guest and Shearer had made a guest appearance as part of Spinal Tap.
The Season
Crystal, Short, and Guest wasted little time putting their stamp on the creative vacuum that they walked into. Ebersol was by all accounts a very good network executive, but he was not a comedian and didn’t come from a creative background. By the season opener, Crystal was already doing his Fernando Lamas impression ("You look mah-velous!") and Short had brought his Ed Grimley character with him from SCTV. By the third show, Crystal and Guest had worked up a breakout routine with their characters Willie and Frankie, who would continuously one-up each other with pain-inducing practices ("I hate it when that happens"). The show never missed a chance to exploit the new popular sketches — a hallmark of the Ebersol era — with Crystal doing his Fernando so frequently that the character almost deserved a separate credit in the opening theme.
More than any season before or since, the show relied on pre-taped segments, with Guest, Shearer, and Short preferring to work that way. While it went against the grain of SNL, some of the short films, particularly Shearer and Short playing aspiring male synchronized swimmers and Guest and Crystal portraying aged Negro League baseball stars were as good as anything that the show had produced.
The Oddness
Perhaps the best remembered episode of the season is the one hosted by wrestler Hulk Hogan and Mr. T to promote the first Wrestlemania. In the most famous segment, the pair appears with Crystal on his "Fernando Hideaway" sketch and can't keep a straight face. While Murphy returned to host and the Beatles' Ringo Starr took a turn, the other hosts included figures like Jesse Jackson, Howard Cosell, and Bob Uecker. The first show of the season didn't even have a host.
Additionally, there was little continuity with the show's fake news segment — called "Saturday Night News" instead of "Weekend Update" — with the show's host sometimes doing the anchoring and real newscaster Edwin Newman sitting in once before Guest finally took over midway through the season.
In stark contrast to the hosts, the seasons musical guests were a who's who of mid-80s pop, with acts like The Thompson Twins, Billy Ocean, Bryan Adams, and super-groups The Honey Drippers (featuring Robert Plant), and Power Station (featuring Robert Palmer) all making appearances.
The Aftermath
When an industry-wide writers' strike halted production in early March 1985, the show didn’t return from the forced hiatus. The abbreviated season ended after just 17 episodes. NBC was unhappy with spiraling production costs and Ebersol was unhappy with his creative staff. Shearer had quit the show in January citing creative differences ("I was creative and they were different," he said later). Short and Guest didn't want to keep doing a live show. Louis-Dreyfus and Belushi (along with fellow holdover Mary Gross) had been used so little throughout the season that they wanted out. Crystal, enjoying the biggest success of his career, was seemingly the only one who wanted it to continue.
Ebersol demanded a retooling, wanting to change the format to a completely taped show and with possibly a fixed rotation of guest hosts (his ideas for the rotation included Piscopo and David Letterman). Instead, NBC briefly canceled the show. After rethinking things, the network's executives decided that they would agree to give SNL another chance… if its original creator, Lorne Michaels, would take back over.
Then and Now
Eventually, Michaels agreed to return to the show and retained none of the cast or writers from the previous season. Taking a page from Ebersol's book, Michaels tried to use established actors like Randy Quaid and Anthony Michael Hall (along with Robert Downey Jr. and Joan Cusack) to re-launch the show… which very nearly did lead to the show being canceled permanently. It wasn't until the following season when Michaels entrusted SNL to virtual unknowns like Dana Carvey, Phil Hartman, Victoria Jackson, Jon Lovitz, Jan Hooks, and Dennis Miller that the show started the run that finally established it as the institution it has become.
The goodwill that the show had gained from Crystal, Short and Guest's lone season helped carry it through Michaels' disastrous first season back. Thirty years later, the 1984 - '85 season remains an oddly alluring anomaly in the long comedic history of SNL.

Tribeca Film via Everett Collection
For a film that involves a love triangle, mental illness, a Bohemian colony of free-spirits, an impending war and several important historical figures, the most exciting elements of Summer in February are the stunning shots of the English country and Cornish seaside. The rest of the film never quite lives up to the crashing waves and sun-dappled meadows that are used to bookend the scenes, as the entertaining opening never manages to coalesce into a story that lives up the the cinematography, let alone the lives of the people that inspired it.
Set in an Edwardian artist’s colony in Cornwall, Summer in February tells the story of A.J. Munnings (Dominic Cooper), who went on to become one of the most famous painters of his day and head of the Royal Academy of Art, his best friend, estate agent and part-time soldier Gilbert Evans (Dan Stevens), and the woman whom they both loved, aspiring artist Florence Carter-Wood (Emily Browning). Her marriage to Munnings was an extremely unhappy one, and she attempted suicide on their honeymoon, before killing herself in 1914. According to his journals, Gilbert and Florence were madly in love, although her marriage and his service in the army kept them apart.
When the film begins, Munnings is the center of attention in the Lamorna Artist's Colony, dramatically reciting poetry at parties and charming his way out of his bar tab while everyone around him proclaims him to be a genius. When he’s not drinking or painting, he’s riding horses with Gilbert, who has the relatively thankless task of keeping this group of Bohemians in line. Their idyllic existence is disrupted by the arrival of Florence, who has run away from her overbearing father and the fiancé he had picked out for her in order to become a painter.
Stevens and Browning both start the film solidly, with enough chemistry between them to make their infatuation interesting. He manages to give Gilbert enough dependable charm to win over both Florence and the audience, and she presents Florence as someone with enough spunk and self-possession to go after what she wants. Browning’s scenes with Munnings are equally entertaining in the first third of the film, as she can clearly see straight through all of his bravado and he is intrigued by her and how difficult she is to impress. Unfortunately, while the basis of the love triangle is well-established and entertaining, it takes a sudden turn into nothing with a surprise proposal from Munnings.
Neither the film nor Browning ever make it clear why Florence accepts his proposal, especially when they have both taken great pains to establish that she doesn’t care much for him. But once she does, the films stalls, and both Stevens and Browning spend the rest of the film doing little more than staring moodily and longingly at the people around them. The real-life Florence was plagued by depression and mental instability, but neither the film nor Browning’s performance ever manage to do more than give the subtlest hint at that darkness. On a few occasions, Browning does manage to portray a genuine anguish, but rather than producing any sympathy from the audience, it simply conjures up images of a different film, one that focused more on Florence, and the difficulties of being a woman with a mental illness at a time when both were ignored or misunderstood.
Stevens is fine, and Gilbert starts out with the same kind of good-guy appeal the won the heart of Mary Crawley and Downton Abbey fans the world over. However, once the film stalls, so does his performance, and he quickly drops everything that made the character attractive or interesting in favor of longing looks and long stretches of inactivity. He does portray a convincing amount of adoration for Florence, although that's about the only real emotion that Gilbert expresses for the vast majority of the film, and even during his love scene, he never manages to give him any amount of passion.
Cooper does his best with what he’s given, and tries his hardest to imbue the film with some substance and drama. His Munnings is by turns charming, brash, and brooding, the kind of person who has been told all of their life that they are special, and believes it. He even manages to give the character some depth, and even though he and Browning have very little chemistry, he manages to convey a genuine affection for her. It’s a shame that Munnings becomes such a deeply unlikable character, because Cooper is the only thing giving Summer in February a jolt of life – even if it comes via bursts of thinly-explained hostility. It's hard to watch just how hard he's working to connect with his co-stars and add some excitement to a lifeless script and not wish that he had a better film to show off his talents in.
Unfortunately, by the time Florence and Gilbert are finally spurred into activity, the film has dragged on for so long that you’re no longer invested in the characters, their pain, or their love story, even if you want to be. Which is the real disappointment of Summer in February; underneath the stalled plot and the relatively one-note acting, there are glimmers of a fascinating and compelling story that’s never allowed to come to the forefront.
2/5
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Orion Pictures Corporation via Everett Collection
It's 2014 and I was looking back at the movies that came out in 1984. I was blown away by the number of good movies that came out that year. I was then moved to tears that they are now 30 years old ... which means I'm getting older, since I saw most of, if not nearly all 10 of these in the theater.
The Terminator
Conan The Barbarian had put Arnold Schwarzenegger on the map, but this was the one that made him an A-list action superstar. The funny thing? He originally was supposed to play the role of the good guy, but he decided to be the unstoppable killing machine instead. Somewhere, in an alternate universe, some puny wimp is uttering "I'll be back ..." and their movie world is much poorer for it.
16 Candles
Molly Ringwald and John Hughes formed such a perfect tag team in the '80s Teen Movie genre that they could have probably won the WWF (it was called that in the '80s) Championship. Anthony Michael Hall also owes SUCH a huge debt of gratitude to this movie. There's also a very strong chance that the character of Long Duk Dong would probably not exist if this movie was made today.
Beverly Hills Cop
This was another star-making vehicle, this time with Eddie Murphy driving it. The former Saturday Night Live actor played wisecracking Detroit detective Axel Foley to perfection. Add Jonathan Banks as a dead-eyed hitman and Judge Reinhold as a hapless Beverly Hills Detective and it's no wonder this movie stayed in the theaters as long as it did.
Gremlins
Admit it - when you saw this movie, you SO wanted a Mogwai. Gizmo was SO cute and it was very sad that he was really a mechanical creature. The Gremlins, though. They scared the living daylights out of me. But Phoebe Cates ... mmm. Yes. Phoebe Cates.
Ghostbusters
I'm amazed that I'm at the fifth movie and am JUST getting to Ghostbusters. Who can forget Dan Aykroyd, Bill Murray and Harold Ramis as they tracked down supernatural ghosts. Dean and Sam Winchester would have learned a thing or two from these guys, like answering Yes if someone asks if you are a god. Ooh. I think I hear a doggie that someone left outside.
The Karate Kid
Forget the Jackie Chan/Jaden Smith remake: this is the best Karate Kid. Ralph Macchio and Pat Morita gave us an unforgettable film, and it also helped keep Billy Zabka in the spotlight, with his recent guest appearances on How I Met Your Mother. Wax on, Wax off, indeed. Also, I had SUCH a huge crush on Elizabeth Shue back then.
Red Dawn
Another classic that blows the horrible remake away. Sorry, C. Thomas Howell, Lea Thompson, Patrick Swayze and Charlie Sheen's combined starpower incinerate the cast of the 2012 version. Also, that opening scene with the Russians parachuting to the ground gave me nightmares for MONTHS.
Footloose
Kevin Bacon's version didn't even NEED a remake. I don't understand what the powers-that-be were thinking when they greenlit the new film. As cheesy and corny as it is, it's also awesome, what with John Lithgow and Lori Singer turning in some fine performances. Also ... Kenny Loggins, man. Kenny Loggins. That is all I have to say.
A Nightmare On Elm Street
This is the only movie that I didn't see in the theater, because I am a huge wimp and I do NOT like seeing gory horror movies. This was such an innovation though, what with the genre being populated by the silent Jason Voorhees and Michael Myers. Freddy Krueger and his persona were such a huge change. That was before it devolved into silly sequels before the remake tried to breathe new life in the franchise.
This Is Spinal Tap
This is the mockumentary to end all mockumentaries. It's hilarious from the get-go. Who can forget Harry Shearer getting stuck in the chrysalis? One word: Stonehenge. Also, despite the dangers that this movie espoused, I am a drummer to this very day. I can proudly say that I have yet to spontaneously comb
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Lions Gate via Everett Collection
When we last left our heroes, they had conquered all opponents in the 74th Annual Hunger Games, returned home to their newly refurbished living quarters in District 12, and fallen haplessly to the cannibalism of PTSD. And now we're back! Hitching our wagons once again to laconic Katniss Everdeen and her sweet-natured, just-for-the-camera boyfriend Peeta Mellark as they gear up for a second go at the Capitol's killing fields.
But hold your horses — there's a good hour and a half before we step back into the arena. However, the time spent with Katniss and Peeta before the announcement that they'll be competing again for the ceremonial Quarter Quell does not drag. In fact, it's got some of the film franchise's most interesting commentary about celebrity, reality television, and the media so far, well outweighing the merit of The Hunger Games' satire on the subject matter by having Katniss struggle with her responsibilities as Panem's idol. Does she abide by the command of status quo, delighting in the public's applause for her and keeping them complacently saturated with her smiles and curtsies? Or does Katniss hold three fingers high in opposition to the machine into which she has been thrown? It's a quarrel that the real Jennifer Lawrence would handle with a castigation of the media and a joke about sandwiches, or something... but her stakes are, admittedly, much lower. Harvey Weinstein isn't threatening to kill her secret boyfriend.
Through this chapter, Katniss also grapples with a more personal warfare: her devotion to Gale (despite her inability to commit to the idea of love) and her family, her complicated, moralistic affection for Peeta, her remorse over losing Rue, and her agonizing desire to flee the eye of the public and the Capitol. Oftentimes, Katniss' depression and guilty conscience transcends the bounds of sappy. Her soap opera scenes with a soot-covered Gale really push the limits, saved if only by the undeniable grace and charisma of star Lawrence at every step along the way of this film. So it's sappy, but never too sappy.
In fact, Catching Fire is a masterpiece of pushing limits as far as they'll extend before the point of diminishing returns. Director Francis Lawrence maintains an ambiance that lends to emotional investment but never imposes too much realism as to drip into territories of grit. All of Catching Fire lives in a dreamlike state, a stark contrast to Hunger Games' guttural, grimacing quality that robbed it of the life force Suzanne Collins pumped into her first novel.
Once we get to the thunderdome, our engines are effectively revved for the "fun part." Katniss, Peeta, and their array of allies and enemies traverse a nightmare course that seems perfectly suited for a videogame spin-off. At this point, we've spent just enough time with the secondary characters to grow a bit fond of them — deliberately obnoxious Finnick, jarringly provocative Johanna, offbeat geeks Beedee and Wiress — but not quite enough to dissolve the mystery surrounding any of them or their true intentions (which become more and more enigmatic as the film progresses). We only need adhere to Katniss and Peeta once tossed in the pit of doom that is the 75th Hunger Games arena, but finding real characters in the other tributes makes for a far more fun round of extreme manhunt.
But Catching Fire doesn't vie for anything particularly grand. It entertains and engages, having fun with and anchoring weight to its characters and circumstances, but stays within the expected confines of what a Hunger Games movie can be. It's a good one, but without shooting for succinctly interesting or surprising work with Katniss and her relationships or taking a stab at anything but the obvious in terms of sending up the militant tyrannical autocracy, it never even closes in on the possibility of being a great one.
3.5/5
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FOX
Actress Marcia Wallace died this weekend, marking the first major member of The Simpsons' talented voice cast to depart in 25 seasons. Wallace's only recurring character on the series was Edna Krabappel, Bart's perpetually frustrated fourth grade teacher. While Harry Shearer and Hank Azaria may dazzle with their many voices, Wallace's consistent performance as Edna kept her a major part of the voice cast. Mrs. Krabappel was a great foil for Bart and a perfect example of just how hilarious a pathetic character can be. Over the years, Mrs. Krabappel went from simply a stressed out teacher to a booze-soaked, aggressive, oversexed cynic married to Ned Flanders (though we all know her true love was Principal Skinner). From her smacking of Bart to her becoming a Comic Book Guy-loving runaway bride, The Simpsons would have never been the same without Edna Krabappel. Like almost all Springfield residents, she was hilarious, but the inherent tragedy behind her character made her empathetic even when she was drunkenly wreaking havoc during an assembly:
There are many distinct laughs on The Simpsons, but none can pack as much derision into a single syllable as Mrs. Krabappel's "HA!"
The character was responsible for plenty of classic visual gags, too — like her burlesque act.
And she alternately helped and hurt Bart in class, both delighting in coming up with punishments for her most annoying student and yet also, deep down, a decent teacher.
And if that's not enough evidence of her comedic talent, Wallace also played Bob Newhart's secretary in The Bob Newhart Show:
The writers and producers of The Simpsons have decided to retire Edna Krabappel for the remaining run of the show. Although we'll miss the character, we know that this is the right choice, as few could uphold the character with the same lively despair that Wallace pumped into her week after week for 25 years.
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Comedy rock act Spinal Tap are planning a comeback in 2014. Co-founder Christopher Guest, who performs as guitarist Nigel Tufnel, has revealed he and bandmates David St. Hubbins and Derek Smalls are "in the midst of talking about something for next year" in a new article in Britain's The Guardian.
Guest admits he still can't believe the group he formed with pals Harry Shearer and Michael McKean three decades ago for the mockumentary This is... Spinal Tap has become a cult act around the globe, performing at the greatest venues, including the Pyramid Stage at the Glastonbury festival in England in 2009.
He adds, "It was a fantastic show. There were 130,000 people there or something. Since the film 30 years ago we've gone on tour, playing Wembley, the Albert Hall, Carnegie Hall… It's weird but great. The fiction became real."

Title

Reprised roles for "The Simpsons Movie," an animated feature based on the long running FOX series

Joined NBC's "Saturday Night Live" as a writer/performer

Portrayed G. Gordon Liddy in the Watergate comedy "Dick"

Wrote, directed and starred in his own TV special, "It's Just TV!"

Released the album Songs: Pointed & Pointless, through his Courgette Records label

Played a journalist in the films "Godzilla" and "The Truman Show"

Feature screenwriting debut, "Real Life"; co-wrote with Albert Brooks

Made film debut in "Abbott and Costello Go to Mars"

Hosted, created and executive produced the Comedy Central series, "The News Hole With Harry Shearer"

Cast in the pilot of "Leave It to Beaver" (CBS); played Wally's friend Frankie; replaced by Ken Osmond (as Eddie Haskell) when series went into production

Worked as a freelance journalist and high school teacher after college

Returned to TV, playing a hippie in the telefilm, "Serpico: The Deadly Game"

TV debut, as a child, "The Jack Benny Show"

Wrote, directed, produced and appeared in the comedy special, "Paul Shaffer: Viva Shaf Vegas"

Hosted, wrote and created the radio program, "Le Show" for NPR (National Public Radio)

Achieved cult celebrity status playing bassist Derek Smalls in "This Is Spinal Tap"; also co-wrote the screenplay and songs

Co-wrote and produced Albert Brooks' comedy album, A Star is Bought

Voiced a Dog Announcer in the animated feature "Chicken Little"

Co-wrote and co-starred in the TV special "A Spinal Tap Reunion"

Co-produced, co-wrote (with Rob Reiner) and co-starred in the parody show "The TV Show"

Returned to NBC's "Saturday Night Live" as a writer/performer

Provided voices to Principal Skinner and many other characters for FOX's "The Simpsons"; earned an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Voice-Over Performance in 2009

Re-teamed with Christopher Guest for "A Mighty Wind"

Re-teamed with Guest to play an actor in "For Your Consideration"

Joined the cast of HBO's "Not Necessarily the News"

Earned a Grammy nomination for Best Comedy Album for Songs Of The Bushmen

First film as an adult, "Cracking Up"; appeared as a member of The Credibility Gap

Summary

Having been the voice of 21 characters on the long-running animated sitcom "The Simpsons" (Fox, 1989- ), actor and comedian Harry Shearer was known by millions without most even recognizing his face. A child actor who segued into comedy, Shearer first emerged as an adult in Rob Reiner's beloved mockumentary, "This is Spinal Tap" (1984), while earning laughs on "Not Necessarily the News" (HBO, 1983-1990) and as a writer-performer on "Saturday Night Live" (NBC, 1975- ). After later appearing in big budget movies like "Godzilla" (1998) and "The Truman Show" (1998), he tapped into his more political side to portray Watergate criminal G. Gordon Liddy in the comedy "Dick" (1999). In the following decade, Shearer joined friend Christopher Guest for the director's improvisational satires, "A Mighty Wind" (2003) and "For Your Consideration" (2006). But it was being one of the more versatile voices on "The Simpsons" that proved to be his most valuable contributions, with such noted characters as Principal Skinner, Ned Flanders, Dr. Hibbert and Mr. Burns being among fan favorites. In addition to appearing on and off the screen, Shearer hosted a popular political satire radio program while contributing to numerous publications and websites, including <i>The Los Angeles Times</i> and The Huffington Post. A masterful jack of all trades, Shearer made an indelible mark on entertainment in a wide variety of mediums.

Education

Name

Harvard University

University of California, Los Angeles

Notes

"The scarier reality gets, the more we need satire, and the easier it is. Freud said we make fun of what we fear, and the scarier it gets, the more we need to make fun of it. It's basically our only weapon. The one thing I can be thankful for, over the recent couple of decades, is that [reality] has been a wonderful source of material." - Shearer to Entertainment Weekly, Aug. 3, 2007